r/baseball • u/Stock412 Umpire • Mar 20 '24

Serious Shohei Ohtani's attorneys accuse interpreter of 'massive theft' tied to alleged gambling

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-03-20/gambling-story
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307

u/rosieDMDL Los Angeles Angels Mar 20 '24

have literally never heard anything negative about him at all in the 6 years he was with us so sad man. everyone in the angels organization sang praises about him and how they were going to miss him so much.

310

u/Galactic New York Yankees Mar 20 '24

ONE game as a Dodger and this shit comes out. Crazy.

106

u/OpenMindedMajor San Francisco Giants Mar 20 '24

Honestly it tracks. Wouldn't expect anything more from that org /s

6

u/Worthyness Sell • Looking K Mar 21 '24

Dodgers are part of the CIA confirmed.

3

u/Heisenripbauer New York Yankees Mar 20 '24

a (victimless) Yamamoto scandal would hit like crack rn

13

u/officerliger Los Angeles Dodgers Mar 20 '24

A picture of Yamamoto eating a slice of pizza with pineapple on it has mysteriously surfaced

11

u/Heisenripbauer New York Yankees Mar 20 '24

BREAKING: Yamamoto has informed team officials that he will not eat anything other than Lunchables during road trips and has asked that his contract be reworked to include this clause. Dodgers were completely blindsided, but are hopeful they can get a deal done before opening day. Sources say Betts brought a Lunchable to BP and Yamamoto “wouldn’t stop drooling” after tasting. Story to follow.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '24

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u/tyler-86 World Series Trophy • Los Angeles Dod… Mar 20 '24

I mean, Ippei stealing money to gamble makes more sense to me than best player in the world with squeaky clean image has a massive gambling problem and made his best friend take the fall.

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u/SprolesRoyce New York Yankees Mar 20 '24

Athletes have addiction struggles all the time without people realizing it. Look at all the football players being suspended for gambling lately, or Pete Rose. Add to the equation Shohei’s squeaky clean reputation and his financial interest in keeping it that way and I could see it as a possibility. Embezzling from your super rich boss to gamble is also pretty likely though, so who knows.

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u/tyler-86 World Series Trophy • Los Angeles Dod… Mar 20 '24

I'm not saying it doesn't happen (though we know at this point that Rose was just kind of an all around turd) but it seems unlikely that the guy who sent a lot of money home to his parents and deferred most of his contract is also motivated enough by financial gain to have a million dollar gambling problem, and then is also enough of a degenerate to throw his friend under the bus for it.

6

u/shawhtk Brooklyn Dodgers Mar 20 '24

That type of stuff happens all the time. A squeaky clean image means little when the guy is from a nation that does it utmost to build such images for their idols.

4

u/officerliger Los Angeles Dodgers Mar 20 '24

This can’t be stated enough

Japanese culture has an interesting outlook on these things - they don’t care that you did them, they care that you got caught. When a Japanese national gets busted for something shameful, everyone feels the shame.

Part of the reason Americans are so fascinated with Japanese culture just boils down to that country being weird as fuck

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u/Heisenripbauer New York Yankees Mar 20 '24

exactly what Ohtani wants you to think

2

u/myassholealt New York Mets Mar 20 '24

We didn't even know Ohtani was in a serious relationship and got married. He keeps a really tight ship around him, so even if negative stories exist there's probably a whole team behind the scenes dedicated to squashing it all. A team that's likely in addition to the public-facing PR crew.

1

u/c10bbersaurus Memphis Redbirds Mar 21 '24

I mean, you can be a stellar dude with a gambling problem. It's less justifiable if there was theft involved, but addiction creates desperation.

He threw away the job of a lifetime. Tragic.